The present invention relates to vehicles, and more specifically, to an amphibious vehicle having a single drive system that runs the vehicle whether it is on land, or in water.
There are many circumstances where it is necessary or desirable to have an amphibious vehicle. Examples of situations where amphibious vehicles are used include recreation, flood rescue, thin ice rescue, hunting, fishing, and traveling through areas having both water and solid surfaces.
However, operating in water and on solid surfaces presents vastly different engineering challenges, as evidenced by, for example, cars and boats looking and functioning very differently. The typical way to overcome these engineering challenges in an amphibious vehicle is to provide dual systems for steering, braking, reversing, and so forth—one for water use and one land use. Unfortunately, however, this duplicative engineering renders the resulting vehicle complicated, expensive, and/or more prone to breakage.
While military amphibious vehicles are very durable, they are too complicated to operate and expensive to operate for general civilian use.
As can be seen, there is a need for an amphibious vehicle which is structurally relatively simple, easy to operate, and less expensive to produce than other amphibious vehicles, so as to reasonably lend itself to purchase and use by the population at large. It is desirable that this vehicle has a single drive system, versus duplicative systems for use in water versus solid surfaces.